Willing to pay. While politicians in Washington, D.C., jawboned energy executives, voters in Washington state had a chance Tuesday to trim gasoline prices — and turned it down. Defying conventional wisdom, they rejected a chance to roll back an increase in the state gas tax. With thousands of votes still to be counted, the repeal initiative was trailing, 53%-47%.

The Washington Legislature had enacted a gradual 9.5-cent increase in the gas tax to finance hundreds of sorely needed road and bridge projects. Anti-tax forces, egged on by conservative talk radio, thought repeal would be a snap, particularly after gas prices shot through the roof. But many voters clearly valued the prospect of traffic and safety improvements more than the appeal of saving a buck or two on every fill-up.

Colorado voters sent a similar message last week, suspending the state constitution's tax and spending limits as a way to avoid draconian cutbacks in funding for education and other vital government services.

This sends an encouraging message: Contrary to the mantras of anti-tax zealots, much of the public is willing to accept taxes when it sees a credible return — and recognizes that you get what you pay for.

Spin city. Democrats were crowing Wednesday that their gubernatorial victories in Virginia and New Jersey were a sign of Republican woes nationally and Democratic victories ahead. Republicans claimed the opposite, pointing to a landslide mayoral victory in overwhelmingly Democratic New York City and GOP gains elsewhere.

Both parties are talking through their hats.

Democrats captured the same two off-year governorships in 2001, and Republicans still picked up seats in Congress the next year and retained the presidency in 2004. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a Democrat until he ran on the GOP ticket four years ago, has taken great pains to govern as a non-partisan and is hardly an indicator of how other Republicans will fare next year.

Despite the predictable partisan spin, the truth is that off-year elections are usually meaningless, except for what they say about local and state issues and the strengths or weaknesses of individual candidates.

In Virginia, Governor-elect Tim Kaine did show that a Democrat with a moderate message (and a link to a highly popular incumbent) can win comfortably in the GOP-leaning South. In the glow of Kaine's victory, outgoing Gov. Mark Warner, a centrist Democrat with a hint of presidential ambitions, was also a winner though he wasn't on the ballot.

In a hopeful sign, fiercely negative advertising was a loser. TV spots invoking Hitler's name in a challenge to Kaine on the death penalty, and using the harsh words of New Jersey Democrat John Corzine's ex-wife against him, failed to stop either candidate from getting elected.

Governor Girlie-man? Two years after California voters swept Arnold Schwarzenegger into office as the anti-politician antidote for the state's problems, they delivered him a comeuppance. In a costly special election that most of the state's residents didn't even want, his efforts to reshape state government were all rejected.

Schwarzenegger, who was elected as a common-sense moderate, overreached. He tried to grab unprecedented budgeting authority for himself, dilute political power of state employee unions, make teacher tenure more difficult to get, and take away the Legislature's power to draw legislative and congressional districts.

Result: He alienated police officers, firefighters, nurses and teachers; energized the state's Democratic majority; and lost some GOP support as well. His four initiatives were trounced by as much as 24 points.

Schwarzenegger, who likes to paint himself as the earnest amateur in politics, was already in trouble — his approval ratings having fallen during the campaign to the mid-30s.

He made the same mistake more than a few professional pols have made: believing that the voters who supported his original agenda would be just as enthusiastic for anything else he wanted. He forgot there is little fury greater than that of a consumer who feels victimized by bait and switch.

Lost opportunities. The one California ballot initiative that every voter should have embraced was redistricting reform. In California, as in most states, legislators regularly manipulate the boundaries of U.S. House and state legislative districts to create as many safe seats as possible for themselves and their political pals.

In part because of this partisan gerrymandering, more than 80% of last year's House races nationally were landslides, and as few as 5% of the 435 House seats are expected to be competitive next year.

In California, not one of the state's 173 legislative and U.S. House of Representative seats changed hands in the past election.

Unfortunately, both in California and in Ohio, where redistricting reform was also rejected, the issue got caught up in partisan politics. Democrats led the charge to torpedo it in California, Republicans in Ohio.

Arizona, the last state to remove legislators' power to custom design their own political nests, succeeded because the campaign was largely led by non-partisan citizen activists and good-government groups.

Those pushing reform initiatives for next year in Florida and Massachusetts, and reform proposals in at least a dozen state legislatures and Congress, would do well to learn Tuesday's lesson: Taking this much-abused power away from self-serving politicians is too important to be left to partisan politics. It requires a credible champion.